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The Campaign Trail
The Battles vs The War Most campaigns will focus on a scenario that has easily-defined geographic boundaries, for players if the not the effects. Primal Magic turns the entire Forgotten Realms into a potential theater of war. With this background, DMs can create specific quest lines that take the characters around the world and well beyond it. The scale of the campaign is limited only by time and sanity. While this framework provides ultimate, inclusive flexibility, it can be overwhelming on where to start. The Campaign Trail gives DMs momentum: introductory situations and scenarios that will help get the players rolling. It provides a few successive objectives, but in here is a DM judgement call: once the game is rolling, if the players are enjoying the campaign at that level and tempo, let them jump to other scenarios at that scale. Just because they level up doesn't mean they're forced to level out. On the other hand, if players are enjoying the climb in level progression, then be sure to move them between challenges and occasionally dip back to show the fruits of the efforts on previous fronts. Part of the intent of this campaign is to show that what the characters did means something. Even if they weren't the tip of the spear, they participated and contributed. And sometimes, when success backslides and their work is undone, it can also be a great tool to set up a persistent enemy. Ultimately, this is about big-picture progress against forces that embody death and destruction. How does the DM keep the players relevant in a war that has a dozen fronts? That, fortunately, is the easy part: no matter which battles the PCs engage, each of those battles have stakes. The outcome permanently changes that area, for better or worse. Before a DM creates a single map, they need to get meta. Stonehearth is motivated the Ethic of Light and the Duty to Act. What does that mean? When you read about a "Primal Campaign" versus a "Stonehearth Campaign," what does that mean? Learn what makes Stonehearth tick and more: * [[Dungeon Meta|''Dungeon Meta]]' for Dungeon Masters... __TOC__ '''T-minus and Counting... The prelude to every campaign is DM prep and character creation (or import). Here is where players should read [[the Crucible|''the Crucible]], then work with the DM to find the common ground between the type of character they're interested in, what kind of pace they're expecting, and what kind of campaign the DM is comfortable guiding. Once the players have characters, it's time to run a few small preliminary scenarios: enough to familiarize everyone with the Primal additions and modifications. How does one wield a ''Wand of Casting? What's the rate of fire for a Musketeer's projector? How fast does an ArCorps wizard recover that Fireball? These preliminary quests are the chance to learn rule mechanics while plot impact is minimal. Familiarization to the primal rules may take several sessions, maybe even a campaign on its own. This is the perfect chance for a Primal Campaign before kicking off a Stonehearth Campaign. Once everybody is up to speed, the DM should run the Zero Hour scenario. It's not absolutely necessary, especially if all the players are on a distant "allies" route, but it is designed to mark the beginning of Stonehearth's Duty to Act policy – and the tick-tock ''of the game's narrative clock. Assuming characters survive Zero Hour, it is now imperative to House Stonehearth that they make progress on their [[Stonehearth Ambitions|Strategic Objectives]]. Whether this is a group of marines heading to sea to interdict a red dragon, soldiers of the Arms running operations against Larloch, or meeting a major troll offensive coming out of the Trollclaw Hills, there is plenty to do. So, ''in order... The Prelude DM preparation is key, but we're going to assume you've got that under control. The other major part of the prelude is establishing that interface between you and the players. Once a group decides on making a run through the Primal universe, their next step is character creation or import. Direct them to [[The Crucible|'The Crucible']] to give them a sense of context and suggestions for backgrounds. The background they select is going to affect the character, and the character is going to affect how they interact with the campaign's scenarios. A Session Zero can help players get their characters on the same page – or at least close enough to make a scenario work. If the players are coming from disparate backgrounds, it's going to be a challenge finding logical tie-ins. Not impossible, it just depends on how much homework the players and DM are willing to do. We encourage players to work together to make a smooth tie-in. For example, they might all be from different regions, but they emigrated to the Marquisate, enlisted at similar times and now they're all members of the same Mobile Infantry unit. If most are newer players and there's one experienced player, you might give the Old Hand a extra couple of levels and make them a corporal or sergeant, guiding the rest of the privates. If the players go all Roleplay Rembrandt, turning into narrative artists as they build their in-game self, we'll do our best to help the DM figure out the party's "special circumstances"... 'Warming the Engines' These are suggested templates for introductory scenarios. There is definite risk to these missions, but it's a controlled pace and should allow familiarization over frustration. As everybody (including the DM) acclimates to the Primal rules, the speed of the encounters can pick up. * Vetting the Candidates: Non-Stonehearth characters start here, especially those on the ally path. * [[Training Room|'Training Room']]:''' Low-Priority Missions for the Stonehearth Arms. '''Zero Hour As much as House Stonehearth is a force for good, it also a force for change. Those two factors alone guarantee suspicion and hostility in a world where the status quo was often the key to survival. When a group openly embraces the light as Stonehearth has, it becomes a high-profile, high-value target for every other group looking to make a point at their expense. Now, as Stonehearth stands ready for a major operation in the Troll Hills, chaos is coming to North Point... * [[ZHDMnotes|'Zero Hour DM Notes']] start here. * Zero Hour also has a convenient, player-facing page to help set the scene... Go Time Keep the Operational Tempo at full throttle with these bridge missions to your own content. * Ready Room: High-Priority Missions for the Stonehearth Arms. * [[A Position of Trust|'A Position of Trust']]: High-Risk Missions for Allies. Category:DM/GM Notes